The sun hadn’t risen yet. After circling once under the cover of darkness, our van and truck pulled up to Chevron’s world headquarters. Our affinity group (Bay Rising Affinity Group aka BRAG!), burst out of the van and deployed our barrels, lock boxes, and bodies. The cops were waiting for us, but for some reason when we hopped out of the van, they ran the opposite direction. Welocked our arms into place.

Our barricade and occupation of Chevron’s entrance was in place in less than 60 seconds. We completely shut down the main entrance to Chevron’s International HQ. Initially we were worried that we wouldn’t have enough bodies to cross the whole 6 lanes of the entrance – but lucky for us, even though we didn’t reach the other side (at first!), the cops completely shut down the rest of it for us!

Directly related, this interview from (yesterday) Democracy NOW! on the office occupation campaign that is on-going for over two months now…

AMY GOODMAN: And the response of the Democrats? I mean these are Democrat-led bills in both the House, and now this week, the Senate, about to be voted on.

KATHY KELLY: The Democratic National Leadership, with Nancy Pelosi playing a very, very active role, I think, was very anxious about the 2008 elections. They don’t want to be pinned with any kind of allegations that they don’t support the troops. And so they have put forth a bill that would allow for the supplemental spending to go forward, and they have issued a timetable.

But I think Howard Zinn had it right. I mean imagine if the early abolitionists had said we want to see an end to slavery, but we’re going to extend a timetable that would extend it for two more years.

So we have great admiration for the congress people whom you named. I mean Mike McNulty in Albany New York was somebody who vigorously was for the war. He actually appeared at a press conference and apologized to the people who were vigiling on the streets of Albany, saying that he now realized that this spending is wrongful and it has to end.

But I think many people agree with their constituents, if we go into their offices and ask them, so who is asking you to prolong this war, the aides say nobody calls and asks for that.

So who is pressuring Nancy Pelosi and the democratic leadership to prolong the war?

We can’t help but think that it has a lot to do with the major weapon making companies, with the oil execs. And we are very disappointed, really, to see that even groups like moveon.org have gone along with this idea that the supplemental funding bill has to be passed but with some reservations.

And this is just a hoot:

AMY GOODMAN: So you’ll be leading the occupations of Senator Obama and Senator Durbin?

KATHY KELLY: Sure, we think that Senator Obama now has an extraordinary opportunity with a high profile as a presidential hopeful, and we have been disappointed that even though he says he’s against the war, he’s ready to continue paying for it.

AMY GOODMAN: And Hillary Clinton?

KATHY KELLY: Well, Hillary Clinton’s aides have been deeply distressed by people who stayed in her office.

They said that Hillary doesn’t want to be viewed as someone who supports the war.

But we have to insist that they can turn off the funding for the war if they don’t want to see it continue.

Tell Hillarious aides that it is failing … She and Bill supported – and support – this war. Fully.

Amy and KK then turned to a discussion of the ME refugee situation, the large numbers fleeing Iraq… with this at the close… the SHAME is that so many Democrats agree!

AMY GOODMAN: What is the solution overall?

KATHY KELLY: I believe that the overall solution is to bring these Unites States troops home. End the war and put very, very generous packages of reparation and reconstruction into an account that would be made available to Iraqis, but detach that from the United States military or the logistical military security companies that have been attached to the United States. Certainly the United States owes people in Iraq a huge apology for what has been done. However, it seems that President Bush’s statement in January was that he thinks the problem is that Iraqis aren’t showing a sufficient level of gratitude.

Yet sometimes, many times, military force is a force for good. There are evil people in the world, doing evil things. And all the sanctions in the world, all the strongly worded denunciations, will never have the effect of a 1,000 pound bomb.

If only Nancy hadn’t taken it off the table and if only the so-called progressive blogs had not treated part of the Constitution as ‘Impeachment Porn’ but as the legal remedy it was intended to be by the Founding Fathers, to rid the country of lawbreaking elected officials.

These blogs should should have been a megaphone for the people to uphold the Constitution, instead they acted like the hired hands of corrupt machine politics whose job it has been to muzzle the very voices they claim to represent.

Ironic how often we tried to tell them that once the magnitude of the crimes of this administration were made public, their concerns about votes in the Senate for conviction (or excuses) would no longer be valid. Once again the ‘pragmatists’ are proven wrong. Ironic that it is Republicans who are willing to discuss impeachment, and who are backing away from Gonzales, Cheney and increasingly from Bush.

Democrats lost the chance to be out front on responding to the concerns of the people regarding corruption by keeping everything on the table and by being very vocal about it.

Like this:

Related

“A source from the office of Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) tells the New York Observer that subpoenas to compel White House adviser Karl Rove and former counsel Harriet Miers to testify before the Judiciary Committee regarding their roles in the dismissals of eight US Attorneys have been authorized and are ready to be issued.”

Bravo to the folks at Chevron. I feel like a coward when confronted by their willingness to put their bodies on the line. They are doing what SMBIVA advocates … STOP THE TRAFFIC:

An essential entailment of any degree of democracy, in a world like ours, is fear – fear on the part of the elites that the natives may be getting restless. Peaceful, legal protest, and especially participation in the electoral charade, have the opposite effect. They reassure the elites that the natives are not at all restless – that the natives accept their impotence and, so to speak, prefer watching pornography to engaging in real sex. The pornography I mean is, of course, the contrived theater of “politics” as that term is ordinarily understood. And what would be the political equivalent of real sex?

Real politics doesn’t necessarily imply hanging “investment bankers” from lampposts – though that would be fun as well as salutary. It is not, however, essential, at the moment, and perhaps not ever. The elites know they are greatly outnumbered by the rest of us, and they are fundamentally frightened of us. All you have to do is stop traffic.

Stopping traffic is, in fact, the minimum precondition for real politics, and thus of real democracy, just as the touch of skin on skin is the minimum precondition of real sex.

Interestingly, it has never been easier to stop traffic. Those Merry Pranksters in Boston a few weeks ago did it with a handful of blinking LEDs. Self-imposed “War on Terror” hysteria and police frenzy have made the armorbound, overgunned Talus of the enforcement state frightened of its own shadow – or, more accurately, of any point of light, no matter how transient and faint, that isn’t its shadow. Anything Caliban sees in the mirror that isn’t Caliban will have Caliban on the floor, chewing the carpet.

DES MOINES, Iowa — Democratic presidential contender Hillary Rodham Clinton has agreed to help one-time candidate Tom Vilsack, who endorsed her on Monday, as he seeks to retire a campaign debt of more than $400,000.

Clinton spokesman Mark Daley said he was uncertain how Clinton would go about raising money for Vilsack, but he conceded that at some point, she would have to contact her supporters. “Someone in her shop is going to have to reach out,” Daley said.

Vilsack and his wife, Christie, endorsed Clinton in her bid for the Democratic nomination at an Iowa news conference on Monday. Daley said there was no connection between the fundraising and the endorsement.

“There was no quid pro quo,” Daley said. “They have a long history and if she could be helpful she wants to be helpful.”

Oh, sure there wasn’t, and Bubba promised not to cum in the intern’s mouth.

One of the things that totally pisses me off is how Big Oil is trying to co-opt bio-fuels/renewable resources to mollify a public that is very restive. Switch grass and Bio diesel (etc) needs to be done by Willie Nelson’s and Tuston’s and joe schmoes, not multinational corps; just like we need to move away from the electrical energy grid and produce our own green electricity, individual and cooperative (and some for profit, they don’t need to be at odds) ventures to produce green fuels locally. Chevron and the gestures the gov’t are making aren’t only Kabuki, they are actively subverting the solutions to our problems (kinda like BBB’s, but cosmically larger)

well, I’m not sure that the best way to deal with an out-of-control megalomaniac is to chide him like a grandmother. I’m sick of them playing these soft games.

WHY WHY WHY do I have to rely on WINGERS to speak clearly and strongly about what is wrong. Why is Chuck Hagel, a far-right social conservative, and Jack Murtha, a center-right militarist, the people who speak so much more plainly? Now, just to make my head explode, Bob Barr, who’s already done yeoman’s work with his former enemies, the ACLU, on the PATRIOT Act, is now become a lobbyist for the Marijuana Policy Project!!!

“I, over the years, have taken a very strong stand on drug issues, but in light of the tremendous growth of government power since 9/11, it has forced me and other conservatives to go back and take a renewed look at how big and powerful we want the government to be in people’s lives,” Barr said.

Aaron Houston, the project’s government relations director, said Barr brings a “great deal of credibility, particularly among people on the Republican side of the aisle.”

“He certainly would not have been the first person I would have expected to sign off to us, but I’m very pleased that he has,” Houston said. “I’m very pleased that he has come around, and I hope he serves as an example to his former colleagues.” [snip]

“A lot of conservatives have expressed great concern over the taxpayer money that is being wasted on this poorly run advertising campaign,” said Barr, who left Congress in 2003.

Houston said the project is a non-profit that seeks protections for medical marijuana patients and caregivers and advocates no jail time for marijuana use. Barr said there might be “legitimate medical uses of marijuana and we ought not have this knee-jerk reaction against it, and people ought to be allowed to explore.”

Yeah if the stakes weren’t so high I’d mostly feel sorry for her (instead of the indignant anger). Underneathe all the layers of squid pro quo the “soul” has whithered and only tentacles pulling very fashionably dressed limbs animate her now.

During the 06 democratic whatever I heard that Nancy, who campaigned hard (after all it was part of the Speaker campaign) and went to all sorts of venues in all sorts of states, was fully on auto pilot.

Don’t worry yourself on my account. If I have anything really importnat to say, I can always e-mail you that I’ve posted something… Should I maybe post under a name beginning with a letter of the alphabet that wordpress doesn’t regard as a ‘spammy’ letter? If so, what are the ‘spammy’ letters?

But that doesn’t mean he has become a bong-ripping hippie. He isn’t pro-drug, he said, just against government intrusion

I think Barr and others like him have seen what they midwifed in the 80’s and 90’s begin to grow into the mad beast it will become and now regret some of their evil ways (but mostly they’re still ugly mutherfuckers).

Oh, I can’t STAND him and Hagel … that’s what makes it so damned galling. I’m glad they they have more integrity than most rightwingers, but it makes me sick that the Democrats, out of consultant-whipped fear, refuse to speak clearly on this stuff.

For the most part libertarians have always been opposed to the drug war. That’s why Barr’s support of this initiative does not surprise me [nor does his organizing against the Patriot(sic) Act]. This is interestingly why Barry Goldwater almost looked like a liberal in the ’80’s & was completely opposed to the style of conservativism that ironically claimed him as it’s patriarch. Goldwater was a classic western style small government pro military libertarian… Kind of like Markos…

S.V. I don’t want to delve to far into the “dark side” here but the Hokusai image has incredible currency. I remember peeking at an older cousins Heavy Metal comic in the 70’s and seeing similiar images. Additionally tentacles/octopus/squid imagery figures nearly ubiquitously in today’s ‘hentai porn.”

There is a marked difference between Hokusai and the modern examples; namely implicit violence. The modern images always take place under a context of forced intercourse (you know kiddies, RAPE), and I don’t detect any threat (other than to the fisherhusband’s place in his wifes affections)

I can’t really speak from a female perspective (obviously), but I know that for many men that imagery is powerfully stimulative. But is it for many women? I find it significant that the title of the Hokusai’s print is the woman is identifiable as a male possession (i.e. …the FISHERMAN’s wife).

But my use of the tentacle metaphor for spkr. Nancy actually came out of a typo (i hit the s before the quid, and went with it from there)…or maybe I’m paddling up denial and my Freudian slip is showing?

Whatever, I came into the world bare assed and I mantain my right to embar(e)ass myself.

I can promise the president from Texas that this ill-begotten, poorly planned and mismanaged war will be his lasting legacy when, in 22 months, he packs his bags and heads home to the ranch in Crawford.

Iraq will hang around his neck – and those of Cheney and Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle and Douglas Feith – like a rotting albatross for all the days of their lives.

No doubt the contractors who are bloated like ticks on the billions they’ve sucked out of the public trough will write the checks to build George W. Bush a really fine presidential library on the campus of Southern Methodist University.

All of it will be a lie, just like the lies his administration told to beat the war drums five years ago.

How will the curators portray the broken military, the broken Constitution, the broken laws, the forever broken troops who came home missing limbs or eyes or pieces of their brains, the broken promises to cherish and care for the families of those who were killed and those very wounded veterans?

How will they portray the corruption, both real and spiritual, that this man and his accomplices have visited upon a nation and a people who once could be proud of their place in this world?

#4 MiTM retiring the Vilsack debt. Some question that Vilsack jumped in to keep Feingold from running since he would have taken Iowa. I can picture the Hillary people in the backroom smoking cigars with the Vilsack people and the sleazy handshakes all around. It’s all rigged too tightly.

Despite all these horrors, and in a further demonstration of another of history’s lessons, we have learned absolutely nothing. For all their supposed opposition to the Bush crazies, most of the liberal and progressive blogs have virtually nothing to say about the prospect of an attack on Iran — or, to be more precise, nothing to say that impels them to act (or even to encourage others to act) in a way that might actually matter and prevent the ultimate nightmare from descending upon us, and upon much of the rest of the world. In the political calculus of these carrion-feeders, the most urgent story is the Bush administration’s politicization of the Justice Department. Needless to say, before the installation of George W. Bush in the White House, misdeeds of this kind never soiled the intact virginity of the morally perfect American republic.

Take the lesson: murder hundreds of thousands of people for no reason at all, completely destroy a virtually defenseless country, and do everything possible to begin what could turn into a nuclear Armageddon that would murder millions — and the worst that will be said about you is that you are an incompetent and stupid bumbler. That we are well on our way to becoming one of the most monstrous nations in history is the thought that cannot bear serious contemplation by our governing class, or by those bloggers who serve as its ignorant and/or corrupt apologists. But threaten the prerogatives of the privileged ruling elites themselves, and hellfire shall devour your soul. Never mind the suffering and death of “ordinary” people: trampling on the inalienable “rights” of those who already possess immense power is the unforgivable sin. Priorities, indeed. The final destruction of the American republic may be almost upon us, and the Republicans and Democrats and their respective blogger-enablers fight like disease-infested rats over the rotting, bloated, already stinking flesh of the doomed, permanently corrupted corporatist state.

The open secret about the Iraq occupation is that the Democrats could end it in a matter of months if they chose to, as Feingold, Kucinich and one or two others have made absolutely clear. Instead, and please let us state the critical fact accurately, the Democrats have chosen to fund the continuation of the Iraq occupation for the indefinite future. The Democratic apologists can spew and spit and slander their critics as much as they wish, but the further fact is that the Iraq abomination is now theirs as much as it is the Republicans’. In a particularly vile, fact- and logic-obliterating turn, one that in my view reveals an intellectual and moral corruption that is as irreversible as it is despicable, certain alleged “progressives” inform us that principled opponents of the criminal invasion and occupation of Iraq are the ones prolonging this catastrophe — while those who provide the money required for its continuance are actually those who are ending it. When the truth reveals you to be a contemptible, unprincipled coward, lies become your friends. Orwell would be proud. Most of the major “progressive” blogs echo this nauseating effluvium in various ways; liars, all of them. Since almost everyone who works in politics lies much of the time, I might overlook this unremarkable fact — but it is impossible to overlook the fact that they’re such lousy liars.

The Democratic apologists can spew and spit and slander their critics as much as they wish, but the further fact is that the Iraq abomination is now theirs as much as it is the Republicans’. In a particularly vile, fact- and logic-obliterating turn, one that in my view reveals an intellectual and moral corruption that is as irreversible as it is despicable, certain alleged “progressives” inform us that principled opponents of the criminal invasion and occupation of Iraq are the ones prolonging this catastrophe — while those who provide the money required for its continuance are actually those who are ending it. When the truth reveals you to be a contemptible, unprincipled coward, lies become your friends. Orwell would be proud. Most of the major “progressive” blogs echo this nauseating effluvium in various ways; liars, all of them.

Japanese hentai, manga & anime are interesting things. Yes, rape imagery is rampant (there is even a “hero” called “Rapeman”), but many of the heroes in these Japanese forms, as well as live action movies, are women. They are often about the business of revenging themselves for these crimes. The male heroes are often effeminate, or young horny boys, not yet men. More masculine characters are very often the villains. How cultures express and work out their issues is a very interesting and strange thing. Even in the more gentle anime the adult male hero is often transformed into a monster or beast (think “Akira” or “Howl’s Moving Castle” as two of the more well-known examples), and it’s often an understanding and brave girl who has to save them. Even the more traditionally violent heroes are atoning for past crimes in many of these stories.

the group in Sac who have been occupying Doris Matsui’s office w/out incident for over 2 months have started getting arrested – I can get a link if you want – an escalation in repsonse to the supplemental bill vote

Leaders of indigenous communities in Ecuador are pressing their government to investigate senior executives from U.S. oil giant Chevron for an alleged environmental fraud scheme in the mid-1990s related to a long-running six-billion dollar class action suit in the South American nation.
. . .

Leaders from CONAIE, Ecuador’s powerful indigenous federation, which represents millions of people, say in a new letter to the Quito government that the U.S. company defrauded the authorities during an environmental clean-up more than nine years ago.

The indigenous leaders named Rodrigo Perez Pallares, Chevron’s legal representative in Ecuador, and Ricardo Reis Veiga, currently a Chevron vice president in charge of downstream operations in Miami, as the masterminds behind a plan that produced “false laboratory tests” to make the environmental damage look far less threatening.

The indigenous people’s letter claims that the officials’ work severely underestimated the amount of toxins in the soil, with the aim of guaranteeing a legal release from future government claims.

The alleged operation involved bulldozing soil and organic debris on top of waste pits rather than cleaning them of poisonous toxins in the 1990s. The letter asserts that both lawyers oversaw this shoddy remediation. Later, Chevron tried to use the action as a defence in various lawsuits arising out of the ecological disaster in Ecuador.

“The crux of the argument is that there was a deliberate effort on the part of Texaco at the time to misrepresent the evidence on the quality of the clean-up and to mislead the Ecuadorian government into thinking a proper remediation has been carried out,” said Kevin Koenig of Amazon Watch, a U.S. environmental organisation that is supporting the indigenous people.
. . .

The suit alleges that Texaco, now Chevron, dumped a whopping 18.5 billion gallons of toxic waste into Ecuador’s rainforest between 1964 and 1992, as it operated a concession that contained 350 well-sites.

The suit also claims Chevron left roughly 1,000 open air toxic waste pits in Ecuador’s ecologically sensitive Amazon rainforest.

I will continue writing, and I will even continue writing about politics. But I will do so from a very different perspective in the future, for I am now entirely convinced that a sufficient number of Americans required for a meaningful resistance movement does not exist. It perhaps would only take a few hundred courageous and dedicated people to begin to build such a movement, but it appears that such individuals are nowhere to be found. In a profound sense, I now feel largely detached from what may happen in the coming months and years, even as I recognize that the horrors may well touch me very personally, as they may touch all of us. There are many subjects and issues that are of great interest to me, and I still find many sources of pleasure in the world. But I feel no sense of urgency about any of it any longer. Given my own circumstances, there is nothing more I can do myself about the growing horrors that are likely to engulf us.

I wish I didn’t feel that way. My abrasive personality doesn’t play well in groups, all I have is words … and it’s too late for them. Watching the banging of the drums for war on Iran is profoundly distressing, and seeing the latest Zogby poll seemingly demonstrating that NEARLY HALF of this country has fallen for the agitprop AGAIN, even now, even after all of the needless death and damage and horror, just makes me draw back and think, “fuck ‘em, they deserve everything coming to them.”

I salute the people above who have the ability and will to go out and get arrested, to stop traffic. I’ll offer my feeble support with my words, but the herd just loves the idea of running over the cliff ahead, eyes focused on the blue skies they’ve been promised await them ahead.

“In beloved Iraq, blood is being shed among brothers in the shadow of an illegitimate foreign occupation, and ugly sectarianism threatens civil war” Abdullah said.

umm, that would be Saudi King Abdullah being quoted at the Arab Summit, & while I’d take most anything coming from him w/ a grain or handful of salt, but IFO is durned near ‘THEM’ -type words, ain’t it?

what’s squid pro quo in that? isn’t he grateful ofr all those weapons we allowed him to buy? sheesh!

SV I know, it was funny. thanks for making the joke because it gave me a chance to tangent off on some thoughts the image provoked and I’d wanted to share but felt somewhat restrained.

and interesting take madman, I haven’t really “studied” the subject enough to know (or the state of Japanese feminisim for that matter) I just have noticed the octopus imagery before and when Mcat posted that old image a bunch of thoughts started jumbling together, like “Why is this fantasy not only popular, but evidently quite old?’ and “Is it reflective of a male/dominator/patriarchical word view, or is it something deeper that paradigms themselves are generated from?” I hope I’m not navigating into waters best left uncharted, but I think it relevant to our wider discussions on feminism.

I’m no expert, just a fanboy who loves asian film, animation and increasingly literature. There are plenty of experts out there who could likely tell me I’m full of shit.

Japanese patriarchy is a different beast than the western version. I don’t know if coming from a culture w/ completely different paradigms, with a different system of representing/recording thought, that it’s all that possible to really compare.

Westerners, esp. the whole anglo-saxon thing in America & Britain, represent a “lower” order of life by referring to bodily functions. Convinced that biological imperatives are something that “lower” humanity, we reflect our loathing in what we use as epithets: shit, piss, bullocks, fuck etc. Again, no expert, but it seems that in Japan, the biological isn’t the problem, but rather that one remove thinking from it, that one BECOMES an animal … that is, just shitting, breeding, eating. I’ve read that swearing in that cuture is more about calling someone an animal.

My heart knows the world is round. But years of “roman rule” education still has my mind ( a terrible thing and often wasted) partially convinced it’s square, and so I have a nagging fear of sailing of the edge, silly desert toad that I am.

Re: cussing
I have the atrocious habit of reading really bad sci-fi, you know the pulp serial shit (altho I haven’t neglected my Dick, Asimov, Gibson etc.). Anyhoo, one of the Star Wars spin offs was about the creatures from the cantina on Tatooine, and the one narrated by the fox humanoid (forget the ‘race” right now) riffed off of swearing. The Foxes, having superior olfactory skills developed increbily subtle and complex cuisines and cursing was a matter of comparing one to bland, tasteless foods.

” Wellington- Children from two Christian schools in
Wellington were given permission to skip classes Wednesday to join a
protest march through city streets demanding that their parents be
allowed to continue smacking them if they misbehave.”

Not that it would matter in terms of my supporting him (he got re-elected solidly statewide in Alabama and is a populist), but I’m curious.

Join the College Kossacks on Facebook, or the Republicans win.

by DemocraticLuntz on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:38:31 AM PDT

He is a DKos guy on economic issues… (0 / 0)

… fairly conservative on social issues, but there is not a lot of press on that stuff because it really doesn’t involve his position right now. Anti-gay marriage, anti-abortion.

by sharris0512 on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:40:46 AM PDT

oThat’s not necessarily a bad thing. (1+ / 0-)

Harold Ford (perhaps incorrectly) felt that he had to emphasize social conservatism because he had cast some votes in favor of abortion rights and gay rights in the past. Sparks can hopefully ignore those issues [and those issues have really hurt the Democratic party in northern Alabama].

Join the College Kossacks on Facebook, or the Republicans win.

by DemocraticLuntz on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:49:18 AM PDT

stances on social issues (1+ / 0-)

Are his social views outside the norm for Alabama? In other words, he may be considered conservative on Social issues to us here. But is he mainstream for Alabama?

Montco (PA) Dems, get involved! Let me help you do it.

by Brother Maynard on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:49:49 AM PDT

+You cannot get elected statewide in Alabama… (1+ / 0-)

… being pro-choice. Sucks, but that’s just the way it is.

by sharris0512 on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:51:00 AM PDT

ok (1+ / 0-)

That was my point. Is he a good fit for the state and the best we can get. Sounds like he is.

Montco (PA) Dems, get involved! Let me help you do it.

by Brother Maynard on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:52:48 AM PDT

Siegleman was pro-choice. (2+ / 0-)

But he didn’t make it a big campaign issue.

Indifference to the sublime wonder of living is the root of sin. — Abraham Joshua Heschel

by countrycat on Wed Mar 28, 2007 at 08:53:44 AM PDT

Here is one of Meteor Blades “Feminismsnists”

#
Like kos said, start a local blog. (1+ / 0-)

I did that in NH for 2006, and if you want to talk about details of how to start out, email me. I’d be happy to give whatever advice and support I can – seeing a local Alabama blog scene develop would be great, especially since it’s a state I love like Alabama.

” Wellington- Children from two Christian schools in
Wellington were given permission to skip classes Wednesday to join a
protest march through city streets demanding that their parents be
allowed to continue smacking them if they misbehave.”

FWIW, I have read that one of the reasons hentai is so popular is because of the taboo against showing actual erect penises in Japanese comics.

My own theory is that in many cultures, this sort of thing is popular because males feel they cannot compete, or sully themselves through contact with the “animalistic” nature of the female. She is not fully human, no matter what she looks like. Men bring in an animal surrogate to “finish the job,” so to speak. It’s a variation of the intense paranoia that many racist male patriarchs in the U.S. have about Black men, and the fear of letting them near “our” (White) women.

Aliens in Sci-Fi (especially the gutter-level-but-glitzy fantasies peddled in HM and its clones) serve a similar purpose.

Pardon me if I am wrong … but I thought the deal the BBB were pushing last time was we take back the houses… by any “D” necessary… then we take care of the base… how did I know then that they were all liars?

well… isn’t there all sorts of swearing. And political imagery and so on…

I mean I just read a slam at Rude Pundit, who I have not read in ages, about his scatalogical sex scenes, and I think the reference was to the homosexual acts carried out by Cheney and/or Rove, usually in some dungeon.

I have read them and screamed wtih laughter thru them. I mean those men are on such a strange trajectory. In real life. And the R party is sooo deeply in the closet.

But his all time best for me (two of them) was a take on Bush SotU speech (I think 2004 or 05) wehre he fucked a monkey to near death as he gave the speech (weeeeeeee the people being the monkey, nothing vague here) and my other favorite was some marauding individual from the gubmint who entered a home and madly got off on stuffed dolly / bear / turtle / dinosaur etc in a some child’s room, iirc.

I mean his scenes of Rovian cheneyian sex are no where near as disturbing ot me as the DAYS of posters at DKos in the wake of the MA SC ruling on gay marriage, going on and on and on (and then more) about gay (meaning male) homosexual sex is “icky”.

Geez Louise.

I was really surprised. And of course they were all in a untidy panic over what it meant for The Big Election, the one they assumed they would win.

Parents of Danbury public school students will receive pictures and addresses of registered sex offenders living in the city in a six-page packet expected to be mailed by Wednesday.

Danbury High School’s Peer Leadership class intended the school system to send out the letter but in the end collaborated with Mayor Mark Boughton. [snip]

The mailing started as a high school project when Danbury High’s Peer Leadership teacher Lisa Frese and a couple of students asked the Danbury Board of Education to send out the letter.

Initially the board agreed, but Superintendent Salvatore Pascarella said he received legal advice to not take part once the pictures and addresses of the victims were attached to the letter.

“The attachments became problematic, with the pictures and names and addresses,” Pascarella said. “For me, it’s a good idea. My worry was accuracy and being able to keep up with all the attachments.”

But he praised the project.

“The kids were civic minded. It was a good activity for them,” Pascarella said.

FEAR IS GOOD. SHUNNING IS GOOD. HYSTERIA IS GOOD. IGNORE THE FACT THAT YOUR ABUSER IS MORE LIKELY TO BE YOUR PRIEST, YOUR PARENT OR ANOTHER RELATIVE.

“Ultimately our goal in peer leadership is to get legislation passed so that the notifications are done to parents through the school districts,” Frese said. “We see the natural link to be between parents and schools.”

Boughton said he was not afraid the information would be inaccurate because the police department knows when offenders move and tracks them in the community.

Yup, the police NEVER make mistakes or use their power to demonize people who can’t protect themselves. I wonder how many of those kids are pushing 18, who may have boyfriends or girlfriends who’re a couple of years younger?

his all time best for me (two of them) was a take on Bush SotU speech (I think 2004 or 05) wehre he fucked a monkey to near death as he gave the speech (weeeeeeee the people being the monkey, nothing vague here)

the whole thing w/ not showing penises in Japan is weird, since traditionally it no big deal. Japan is replete with overt and often violent sexual imagery, but in their porn the genatalia have to be pixilated.

Mcat, I still remember a woman’s discussion group I was in for awhile, back in the 1990s. One of the members was very pro-porn, and she wanted us to hang out at her place after the main meeting to watch some of her favorite films. Ten minutes into the first one, a whole bunch of us were smothering giggles because the “lesbians” all had two-inch-long painted fingernails (hideously impractical, to anyone who thinks about the logistics for a moment, or knows actual lesbians). Also we started making snide remarks about the fact that none of the women were sporting un-surgically altered breasts. Again, obvious to anyone with a cursory knowledge of the female body and how it works.

We were a pretty diverse group, age-wise. 20-60 years. But I wonder how many men of any age have that sort of well-grounded skepticism about the supposed “reality” of even supposedly high-class porn films.

Later, I started to read about the dangerous and coercive nature of the industry, and that was another good reason to reject its products. :(

I will continue writing, and I will even continue writing about politics. But I will do so from a very different perspective in the future, for I am now entirely convinced that a sufficient number of Americans required for a meaningful resistance movement does not exist.

I came to that conclusion a long time ago. Maybe it’s because I’m a furriner and am not emotionally attached to the kind of desperate hope that comes with knowing that one’s country is being devastated while still needing to believe in the hero myth – that someone will save everybody. Not that Americans are incapable of reaching such a conclusion, obviously. It’s just that it’s much more difficult to surrender to the idea that there may not be hope when that really seems to be all you have. As Albright said, “Hope is not a strategy”.

We were a pretty diverse group, age-wise. 20-60 years. But I wonder how many men of any age have that sort of well-grounded skepticism about the supposed “reality” of even supposedly high-class porn films.

I agree that most men wouldn’t have a clue. I, myself go back and forth on porn. I have issues with the industry itself [though that has slowly been changing – there was a large influx of women producers and directors in the ’90’s I believe], but I don’t necessarily have an issue with the product – unless it’s complete crap [which it more often than not is]. I think porn can be a very positive thing. I think sexuality of all sorts should be explored on film, in art, in novels, elsewhere. I’ll even admit that I occasionally ‘use’ porn – though I’m fairly discerning in what I look at & am only remotely aroused by ‘real’ bodies. It’s always been a tough call for me.

Also, back to an earlier post regarding the problems of sex workers, I completely agree that it hollows out the soul through continual exposure to so many sexually demeaning situations [I have several friends who have been prostitutes for a time in their lives]. I would not necessarily say the same of people in the porn industry. I think in many instances it can have the same effect, but it doesn’t have to. If the industry can continue to be cleaned up, people in the porn industry will be able to make healthier choices for themselves emotionally, and really evaluate why they are in the industry and whether or not it does actually fulfill them in some way.

The petrochemical company Chevron is guilty of some of the worst environmental and human rights abuses in the world. From 1964 to 1992, Texaco (which transferred operations to Chevron after being bought out in 2001) unleashed a toxic “Rainforest Chernobyl” in Ecuador by leaving more than 600 unlined oil pits in pristine northern Amazon rainforest and dumping 18 billion gallons of toxic production water into rivers used for bathing water. The toxic crude oil and formation water seeped into the subsoil, contaminating surrounding freshwater and farmland. As a result, local communities have suffered severe health effects, including cancer, skin lesions, birth defects, and spontaneous abortions. Indigenous communities have been dispossessed of their lands, and millions of hectares of rainforest have been destroyed to make way for the company’s pipelines and oil wells.

Chevron is also responsible for the violent repression of nonviolent opposition to oil extraction. In Nigeria, Chevron has collaborated with the Nigerian police and military who have opened fire on peaceful protestors who oppose oil extraction in the Niger Delta. In 1998, two indigenous Ilaje activists were killed by Nigerian military officers flown in by the company while protesting at an oil platform in Ondo state. In 1999, two people from Opia village were killed by military personnel paid by Chevron, after soliciting a meeting to complain about the company’s harmful effects on local fishing. And in 2005, Nigerian soldiers fired upon protestors at Escravos oil terminal, leaving one protestor dead.

Additionally Chevron is responsible for widespread health problems in Richmond, California, where one of Chevron’s largest refineries is located. Processing 350,000 barrels of oil a day, the Richmond refinery produces oil flares and toxic waste in the Richmond area. As a result, local residents suffer from high rates of lupus, skin rashes, rheumatic fever, liver problems, kidney problems, tumors, cancer, asthma, and eye problems.

In December 2004, the Unocal Corporation, which recently became a subsidiary of Chevron, settled a lawsuit filed by 15 Burmese villagers, in which the villagers alleged Unocal’s complicity in a range of human rights violations in Burma, including rape, summary execution, torture, forced labor and forced migration. Despite the settlement, human rights abuses continue along the oil pipeline in Burma, which is still “secured” by the Burmese military. Chevron is responsible for the risks associated with this pipeline.

Running an ad doesn’t imply endorsement. But, if I start rejecting ads, THEN every ad that DOES run has an implied endorsement.

And you guys aren’t idiots. The advertising purity trolls seem to think that site readers are moron automatons easily manipulated by advertising. I have a higher opinion of you guys. I actually think you’re quite intelligent and capable of independent evaluation of the advertising you consume here and elsewhere.

Finally, I’m not afraid of money, and I’m putting it to good use…

Yes, if you have to sell your soul to the devil, who cares? At least you’re getting money out of the deal.

you know I think I remember seeing a “pagans fucking for peace” site posted up at Dkos back in the day, a dreadlocked german couple doing “it” in all sorts of outdoor settings, iirc.

Why not?

Make love, not war.

I’ve read enough erotic literature written by women to realize that a balanced feminine perspective on the eternal and endless permutations of porn is not a black and white issue (e.g. they “hate” it or “the love it”) , but I would have to guess the vast majority of the stuff on line is more than boring to them, its stupid and demeaning. I’m certain that the industry itself chews up young women (who often have sexual molestation in their pasts).

It is what it is, and my only real concern is harm reduction rather than censorship or even vicarious (and hipocritical) judgement. Somehow, and I ain’t volunteering myself and PK for the duty like the germcan couple, if we could fantasize better and engender a gentler, kinder, more truly mutually erotic porn industry humanity would be better served.

anyhoo

Yeah, its only the Bushies/rethugs who hipocritically neglect veterans and employ ethically challenged attorneys:

A law firm appointed by Gov. Janet Napolitano to review conditions at the state veterans home following allegations of patient neglect and nepotism has also been hired by the home to contest some of those same allegations.
But both the governor’s spokeswoman and the firm — which is staffed by the spouses of two Napolitano appointees and other political allies — say the dual role is not a conflict.

Goldwater was a classic western style small government pro military libertarian…

Is that you cannot have “small government” and a large military, much less be a libertarian while favoring a huge standing army, and an air force and navy larger that the combined respective services of the rest of the world. It’s like proclaiming yourself a gold standard socialist, or an anarcho-nationalist. Then again, if not for Big Government, the Goldwater family business would probably have gone belly-up during the Depression. They were saved by obtaining contracts for providing work clothes and equipment for workers employed on various WPA projects. I think they also might have supplied the work force on the Hoover Dam.

The British Government has published a map showing the coordinates of the incident, well within an Iran/Iraq maritime border. The mainstream media and even the blogosphere has bought this hook, line and sinker.

But there are two colossal problems.

A) The Iran/Iraq maritime boundary shown on the British government map does not exist. It has been drawn up by the British Government. Only Iraq and Iran can agree their bilateral boundary, and they never have done this in the Gulf, only inside the Shatt because there it is the land border too. This published boundary is a fake with no legal force.

B) Accepting the British coordinates for the position of both HMS Cornwall and the incident, both were closer to Iranian land than Iraqi land. Go on, print out the map and measure it. Which underlines the point that the British produced border is not a reliable one.

None of which changes the fact that the Iranians, having made their point, should have handed back the captives immediately. I pray they do so before this thing spirals out of control. But by producing a fake map of the Iran/Iraq boundary, notably unfavourable to Iran, we can only harden the Iranian position.

He’s got a couple of great posts about this mess in the Gulf. This one too:

The boundary between Iran and Iraq in the northern Persian Gulf has never been fixed. (Within the Shatt-al-Arab itself a line was fixed, but was to be updated every ten years because the waterway shifts, according to the treaty. As it has not been updated in over twenty years, whether it is still valid is a moot point. But it appears this incident occurred well south of the Shatt anyway.) This is a perfectly legitimate dispute. The existence of this dispute will clearly be indicated on HMS Cornwall’s charts, which are in front of Commodore Lambert, but not of Mr Blair.

Until a boundary is agreed, you could only be certain that the personnel were in Iraqi territorial waters if they were within twelve miles of the coast and, at the same time, more than twelve miles from any island, spit, bar or sandbank claimed by Iran (or Kuwait).

That is very hard to judge as the British government refuse to give out the coordinates where the men were captured. If they really are utterly certain, I find that incomprehensible. Everyone knows the Gulf is teeming with British vessels and personnel, so the position of units a few days ago can hardly be valuable intelligence.

Until a boundary is set, it is not easy to posit where it should be. It has to be done by negotiation or arbitration. I have participated in these negotiations, for example on the boundary between the Channel Islands and France.

With a dead straight coastline with no islands, and a dead straight border between two countries hitting the coast at a right angle, you could have a straight maritime border between the two running out from the coast at a right angle. This never happens.

Is that you cannot have “small government” and a large military, much less be a libertarian while favoring a huge standing army, and an air force and navy larger that the combined respective services of the rest of the world.

Very true – and the quintessential flaw of militaristic libertarianism – then again there are myriad of flaws in economic libertarianism as well… I think that this is one thing that is wonderful about the Greens – they really do want to craft of smaller, less intrusive government & they would do that by scrapping military waste & corporate welfare, ending US imperialism & spending money where it should be spent – fair economic development & small business competition. I don’t know if that would really work either, as at this point I’ve pretty much lost faith in any form of capitalism to succeed. But it’s a nice thought.

I personally think that ‘sustainable’ economic models will be the only ones to save us from certain extinction – and I can’t think of a single one in which capitalism could play a part.

For the first time in history, the DNC’s delegate selection rules require that state parties adopt and implement inclusion plans designed to achieve full participation by LGBT Americans—along with Americans with disabilities and other traditionally underrepresented groups—in the political process. They require the presidential candidates themselves to use their best efforts to meet that goal, and require state parties to certify to the DNC that the presidential candidates have met their obligation. Gone are the days of empty, merely aspirational rules that require state parties to strive for equality but fail to hold them accountable.

The DNC also added Nevada and South Carolina, two states with large politically active LGBT communities, to the early presidential nominating process. This will encourage presidential campaigns to more fully engage the LGBT community in their agendas and will likely mean that their campaigns will hire more LGBT staffers at all levels…

That is the beauty of the 50 State Strategy… it follows the “Golden Rule”… he who has the gold … makes the rules.

require state parties to certify to the DNC that the presidential candidates have met their obligation. Gone are the days of empty, merely aspirational rules that require state parties to strive for equality but fail to hold them accountable.

I am aware that many people have their issues with Dean, but who else in the Democratic Leadership… would demand that Alabama, Mississippi and Texas include LGBT people in their state delegations. This is how to be progressive… not kowtow to the bigots.

well, they’re not interested really in building a D party that expands the rare, good things it’s done … they are mostly selfish former Republicans, racists and homophobes who want to return the D party back to its roots as a racist party.

“It’s awesome,” Cubs star Derrek Lee said. “I think it’s about time. Female eyes are as good as male eyes. Why can’t they be umpires? Good for her.”

[…]

Cubs reliever Scott Eyre liked the idea.

“She’s doing our game? Oh, cool,” he said. “How do I feel about it? I could care less. If she can call a game, she can call a game.”

Wow, maybe we’re finally getting somewhere.

Last time there was a woman umpire (Pam Postema) hovering on the brink of entering the major leagues, pitcher Bob Knepper had this to say:

“I just don’t think a woman should be an umpire. There are certain things a woman shouldn’t be and an umpire is one of them. It’s a physical thing. God created women to be feminine. I don’t think they should be competing with men. It has nothing to do with her ability. I don’t think women should be in any position of leadership. I don’t think they should be presidents or politicians. I think women were created not in an inferior position, but in a role of submission to men. You can be a woman umpire if you want, but that doesn’t mean it’s right. You can be a homosexual if you want, but that doesn’t mean that’s right either.”

I’m OK with porn in principle. In reality, there are some problems with it. However, it’s not a big issue for me, and I think it’s too bad that this has become a major focus of discussions of feminism. I’m really, REALLY tired of hearing Dworkin and Mackinnon dragged into seemingly every discussion. If anyone cared to read what they wrote, they would see it was somewhat more nuanced than “All porn is bad”/”All sex is rape”. Or maybe they wouldn’t see that, being too frantic and scared shitless of women who dare to criticize the porn industry and the way our culture views sex.

#73, lucid – But yeah – why not. It still irks me that it’s quite alright to depict killing in the entertainment world, but sex… noooo – that might turn our children immoral!

We just saw the newest Bond film, Casino Royale, which was rated PG-13 (“some material may be inappropriate for children under 13″). It contained several extremely violent and disturbing scenes of torture and killing. One of my son’s first-grade classmates saw it with his parents. They were fine with it.

“It has never been proven that reaching out to Israel achieves anything,” Prince Saud said. “Other Arab countries have recognized Israel, and what has that achieved? The largest Arab country, Egypt, recognized Israel, and what was the result? Not one iota of change happened in the attitude of Israel towards peace.”

and I think it’s too bad that this has become a major focus of discussions of feminism.

It don’t really get this either. Most of the feminist theory I’ve read doesn’t even touch the issue of porn – sexuality, sure, undermining sexual stereotypes, most definitely… Then again, I kinda skip from early 20th century feminism to French post-structuralism in my reading & have completely neglected ’70’s and ’80’s American academic feminism.

well porn is an industry rife with exploit, some of it utterly brutal, there is NO question about this. and from what I hve read of the internal efforts to campaign for better working environments, the movement is small.

Look, Carol Doda did really well here, but her club (at which she worked) was run by the mob, for many years, it HAD to be a tough working envirnment. She did OK as a massive big name, who also brought in the suburbans, the tourists (not jsut numbskulls agape, some well travelled and smart people too)… but the joint was what it was..

But also, a few years ago I read that Verhoeven (think it was) wanted to make a film of extreme close ups of genitalia in the act of intercourse. And I thought… really interesting. He can get it made, presumably, but then distribution.

And last, I used to work (a long time ago, late 70s early 80s) not that far from the famous Mitchell Brothers, here in sf… and at lunch time the young small town women who worked there, would stop in the shop… It was fascinating… in some ways they were at one of the better places for that sort of thing, the Mitchell brothers did try for some decent worker benefits.. and as I watched them I would think, you know… small town girls, often brought up far from vibrant centers. The options and the choices are limited/can be limited:

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Police stormed the offices of Zimbabwe’s main opposition party Wednesday and arrested its leader hours before he planned to talk to reporters about a wave of political violence that had left him briefly hospitalized.

Which is why, even though I find something like prostitution demeaning and wouldn’t want to encourage anyone to fall into that life [on either side of it], I think prostitution must be legalized as well. Only in that manner can we establish economic regulation that would ensure a safe and equitable work environment for prostitutes.

Fast-forward to today’s showdown. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) had a big victory last week in passing the Iraq supplemental. She convinced all but a few moderate Democrats to accept a timetable for withdrawal. More difficult was persuading the strongest anti-war supporters to support a bill that would in their minds fund the war for another year and a half. The majority was cobbled together with persuasion, muscle, and pork to grease the skids, but in the end, despite the relative narrow Democratic majority, Pelosi was able to hold her caucus together.

So if a version of the supplemental with a timetable for withdrawal makes it through the Congress to the president’s desk and is vetoed, who will be accused of failing to support the troops?

The best card in the Democrats’ hand is public opinion about the war, which is still a millstone around President Bush’s neck. Polls show that substantial majorities oppose the surge and support troops coming home in not too long a timeframe.

But despite this wind of public opinion at their backs, Democrats cannot count on the public blaming Bush for failing to support the troops if he vetoes funding tied to a mandatory troop withdrawal.

First, the House-passed supplemental is too cute; it gives with one hand and takes away with the other. It provides money for troops in the field, but begins to cut back these troops. The president’s position, while not overly popular, is more consistent and comprehensible — support the troops and give them what they need to win.

LOL I read a good line the other day, it may not be well defined, but the public is mad, they want Congress to do SOMETHING and they

want heads on stakes at the edge of town.

Could get rough. Who knows.

LOL on the other hand I just heard via email that the poor Martin nee Booman is awake.

Think I will feed Los Gatos first. They get a vote in my house. Martin nee Booman does not.

I was surprised to hear Madeleine Albright actually state that we have helped contribute to our poor relations with Iran due to “overthrowing their democracy in 1953.” That was on Colbert the other night. Last night? Cant recall. She pointed out that there’s a great lack of understanding here, that most Americans think our bad relations started with the hostage taking.

Well, aint that the truth.

Thing is, the Iranians do not advertise it as they should, which would go a long way toward more effectively showing that there is a lot more behind cries of “Great Satan!” than hyperbolic froth. Not all that hard to imagine why Mullahs/hardliners dont want to bang that gong, as it would whet the people’s appetite for the sort of democracy Mossadegh started up and they dont want – the first and ONLY SECULAR democracy in the Mid East. One that Ike, glorious Ike, finished off in its infancy. (OIL!) The Brits (those helpful cartographers) started pushing for the coup with Truman, who wouldnt bite. But Ike did. Pisses me off when people get all glowy about Eisenhower just because in parting he shot off that great warning re the military industrial complex (“congressional” got edited out).

He gets a pass on his horrendous military (covert) overthrows of nascent democracies in Iran, Guatemala… his steps toward interference in Vietnam and his plans that went thru the pipeline to Kennedy re overthrowing Castro.

Just googled up a summary of Ike’s UNreported horrific legacy, in an article warning about Iraq, 2003. Too bad war criminal Ike didnt warn us about the abuse of covert power.

The porn profession is especially rewarding as the ‘girls’ grow in experience in their profession, when they get past their prime physically.

She isnt a porn star, but beautiful Betty Page comes to mind. Tame stuff, of course. Old Irving Klaw and his silly rubber-ball-in-mouth photo shoots. Very staged look and mild girly w/girly stuff… playfully tied to trees, holding whips, laughing, looking like they could be selling apple pie just as easily as sex.

Betty refused to have her image shown when tracked down in the nineties for an interview. She had converted to Christianity to atone for her ‘sins’ and slipped into anonymity. She refused to be shown because she felt her fans needed to keep the old (young) image in mind. She probably couldnt bear to imagine them seeing the change. She was interviewed in the shadows.

it’s interesting to see Albright and Zbig start to finally wake to the horror THEY helped advance … sadly she still clings to half steps. Zbig seems more willing to completely change the way we do things. Doesn’t wash the enormous amt of blood both of them have on their hands.

I think it’s safe to say that ALL of our Presidents were either unremarkable or they committed terrible crimes. Some worse than others …

I think some of the older porn actresses, like Candida Royale, Nina Hartley and Annie Sprinkle are interesting women, who’ve done some great work in sex ed and artistic expression. Susie Bright is great too, does some interesting stuff on what is both good and bad in porn/erotica (the distinction is fuzzy & subjective, and I refuse to make it).

I think the arguments get a lot of ink and bandwidth because the culture insists that porn IS human sexuality. Which is a big problem, if you are somebody who thinks that sex and sexuality are too big and important to get nothing but an endless ping-ponging back and forth between conservative religious repression and the “ideals” represented by the likes of Larry Flynt.

I have long held the opinion that, if anything, the Flynts and Wildmons need each other. Both are masters and profiteers of a giant spectacle that feeds on depicting women as being male property. Some would call this “patriarchy,” and some would simply call it “show biz.”;)

In a nutshell: I once told a “pro-sex” feminist on another board that I considered a filmed sex act that was fifteen minutes of a two-hour film about a couple (trio, dance troupe, office full of chartered accountants, or whatever) going about their daily lives (talking, fighting, working, shopping, telling jokes, etc.) to be a very different thing than a two-hour film of nothing but wall-to-wall screwing. Oh, she scoffed.You’re just making excuses for what gets you hot and how what gets YOU hot isn’t “porn.” IOW, no sexual act depicted in popular culture should be analyzed as would other depicted acts because analysis of sex makes us hypocrites. [rolleyes] For that matter, it was funny how she assumed that the hypothetical fifteen minute sex act would get me hot. [snerk] I never defined what the act would be or whether it would be whack-off material or not. She just jumped to the conclusion herself that any depicted sex act would automatically make the viewer want to shove his/her hands down his/her pants, or else what was the point of having it there ?

Nina Hartley went on my shit list for good when she lobbied against mandatory condom use in hetero adult films. She is, as an internet buddy put it, the Dick Cheney of porn. Her bread and butter must not be touched, nor should hetero male fantasies of power be inconvenienced for so much as a moment– no matter how many women get sick or die. As for Bright, I find her smarmy and irritating. They all seem to gloss over the ugly side of the business and smear anyone who complains about it as shills for the Christian right. It grieves me that they appear to be the best we can do, so far.

#92, lucid: At least baseball seems to be crawling out of the stoneage… Football, well, that’s the realm of the promise keepers, so I don’t have much hope there.

On the other hand, more gay NFL players have come out of the closet than gay MLB players. After retirement, of course. But still…

I once read an article about female sports reporters looking back on the days when they were first allowed into locker rooms. They said the baseball players were the worst sexists, even worse than the NFL. Basketball players, surprisingly enough, were the most pleasant.

One woman who covered the Blue Jays said the players who were kindest to her were the black guys. They seemed to have more sympathy for people trying to breaking into an establishment that didn’t like them. Plus, they were just much cooler.

Porn, prostitution, “sex work” etc.: yes, absolutely, they should be legal and regulated.

While thinking about baseball, sex, and the Sucking Sea Creature: Wade Boggs comes to mind, he of the “road-wife” – the groupie Margo. He once said that he didn’t go down on her, because he only had to do that with his wife. Not sure what he meant by that, except that perhaps he considered it a chore, and Margo didn’t rate. Boggs was a strange one.

we’d sure have less need for porn if we were capable about talking about sex as if it was some normal natural thing. but no, the first time you find yourself discovering self-stimulation of the genitals while lying on the living room floor watching the bugs bunny show, mother walks in and says “get your hands out of there.” yeah, ruin my morning and my–I was sure it was me–invention of masturbation. (Internally, I called it “fawning”–after Bambi!)

you just get the pertinent information out of porn–what you didn’t get from “You’re a young lady, now!” pamphlets. Ok menstruation. Capability of bearing children. Where were the stiff nipples? Where was the slightest hint one could be aroused sexually? It’s the physiology, dummies. All reduced to a “don’t get knocked up and disgrace us!” warning. My mother didn’t even want me to use tampons when I was a teen (not that I obeyed) “I don’t want you to get used to the feeling”. Well, if the feeling of tampon insertion was all we had to look forward to….humanity would have ceased long ago.

And Martin, in his comments, is still drooling. Which is what he does.

They can take it up iwth all of the deleted commenters (yes I realise mcjoan asked that it be deleted, but why was all that dramaturge X-posted?) at Dkos from the x-post of his suicide declaration and the follow up, also deleted.

Take it up with Delaware Dem who took issue in every possible way. Martin’s friend, her friend. Take it up there..

Bud of buds.

From the original posting at MSOC, she had his LKA in sf by 7:50 am. Assuming her timestamping is accurate. His FP post is timestamped 7AM

It was such a busy day, as anyone who has intervened in a suicide knows. But there was time for x post plus very contentious follow up? And her screaming comments? She went to town (and back again), as she does.

That is the problem everything is wrung out to spot light one person. Fine. But what a shame for tawdry trashed and falling traffic BlogSnotophere. It did it self in. OVer and over.

It sure is not pretty how it evolved, in terms of Blogoland.. Which happened from and in the Dkos diaries.

Martin and Msoc and Steven D can take it up with the Great Dkos Community.

Again a woman in a spiral as (she relentlessly made public, as well, all thru yesterday) her own illness manifests itself… and fills her time with a grip on a vacuous community.

Oh yeah, Madman: Carter was instigating with Iraq v Iran. Kennedy drew up lists of who to slaughter in Iraq – like commie professors, and such. Clinton and his drip drip drip of sanctions/regime change.

I still hear Hillary chirping like a bird in springtime on MTP when Russert was asking her about the upcoming IWR vote, about 2 weeks prior. She just about glowed when she said, “Oh, I have always supported Regime Change!” (Count ME in!) She wasnt satisfied as most were with the standard WMD fearmongering, our Hill. Not that she didnt play that tune too, but she went one better.

I said, uh oh. She’s not out there alone, she’s the harbinger of what’s to come, the messenger.

They are actually investigating and planning to write about Armando’s private life.

They meaning us. Yes, I’m in the process of writing a book on Armando now – interviewing all his ex-wives, girlfriends, disgruntled clients, and so on. It’ll be the first publication of Marisacat Books.

The subject is so endlessly fascinating that it’s a joy working on this project.

lol… the living room floor and bugs bunny. like five years old? on the fucking money.

My friend, who is very cool re sexuality, raised two kids – took her daughter for birth control while in early teens and had a boyfriend – told me of a stint she did working at a daycare center on the upper west side. The Purple Crayon. She said the toddlers were like a fucking basket of worms (ie, masturbating up a storm) during ‘rest time.’ Her theory was that they were a bit beyond the norm because they were the over stimulated products of older first time parents.

I find NYCee’s comment about Page not wanting to appear on screen pretty telling about this culture we’re immersed in– for reasons other than what he probably meant posting it. Somehow we can doll women up to look like silent, glossy playthings, put them in rubber ball gags and three-inch heels and whatever. But somehow we can’t endure a fully-clothed woman with wrinkles and seventy years of life experience sitting before us to talk about it. That really is telling, and tragic commentary on the limits of porn as a tool of “liberation.” :(

Gross generalizations are problematic, but I think that the more a society can do to integrate potential harmful forces (drugs, prostitution, suicide etc.) into the norm (i.e. legalization and related regulatory efforts) the healthier that society is. Forcing the taboo into the dark shadows of judgment only makes the sick parts fester, and stifles and twists what could be valuable into perverse reflections (e.g. Narco trafficantes kill people over the “weed of peace, the herb of wisdom”).

Of course if I had child I’d have no problem them smokin’ herbs or utilizing many of the “illicit drugs” (at the proper age and in a balanced way) but I’m sure I’d be unhappy if they were involved in prostitution or porn in anyway (but then again I think I’d have to proud if I donated gametes for an artist like Anais Nin…a DH Lawrence I’d slap upside the head , but then that impulse might be an artifact of the pompous proffessor who introduced me to his work and unfair to famous author)

Tuston, my problem is that whether you’re talking drugs or sex, you’re asking a system that cares primarily about wringing the average citizen dry for a buck to put in place effective obstacles to fast and easy wringing.

The Swiss have an official governmental policy that ministers should work their way thru to adivising for the use of condoms. big Signs at customs as you arrive, for one thing. About safe sex, for everyone.

I did a post on the Hiv AIDS policies in Switzerland last spring.

I see it gets incoming traffic, still. Of course I also used their official poster, one of them, of nude men fencing…

… is someone I didnt pay much attention to before, but who seems to talk bluntly, in a progressive manner, about issues: Iraq (“war for oil interests”), gas tax (give it back to those paying for ss, medicare), class warfare (wealthy arent taxed enough), curbing the oil monster, and even, (oh horrors/gasp), cutting the military budget… Saw him recently somewhere. I think Russert. Yeah, and Russert was sort of incredulous when he said “our wars for oil, like Iraq,” and asked if he really believed that. Bradley then looked at him incredulously and said, Absolutely!

Refreshing.

Problem is, they all sound better when they arent in the beltway. Gore included. Edwards got somewhat refreshed when he got out. Only a precious few are immune to the toxins, to any appreciable degree, when theyre in it.

But a guy can have his pipedreams and fantasize about humane hedonism and sybaritic splendor (not to mention kool kinky kicks), can’t he?

No, problem. :) I am sitting listening to such musical gems as XTC’s Summer’s Cauldron/Grass and Beth Orton’s Couldn’t Cause Me Harm or Galaxy of Emptiness and trying to imagine what a film that took that kind of look at sex would be like. I’m about 99% sure that it doesn’t exist and won’t in my lifetime. But I leave the 1% to give myself some maneuvering room. :D

Oh, and ms_xeno, actually, I think your thoughts on it were in my thoughts, give or take a nuance or two, perhaps.

On that score, so many women in show business feel the need to go thru plastic surgery, for the reason you mentioned. I find their faces so very distracting. The botox, for one thing, gives everyone the same masky “lion mouth” look. To me. But, funny thing is, I started to notice that, having seen it time and again on aging celebs, year after year, I was starting to get distracted by UNfixed faces – such as Sally Fields. It’s like, wait, this is odd. I am seeing your wrinkles. Arent you supposed to be doing something? Isnt that what you people do now?

I loved Bradley. I must dig up what he wrote after the rodney king trial verdict. it was excerpted in harper’s and I said–this man has to run for president. he did. I gave money. and apparently he talked in compound sentences. even phil jackson’s nudge to get michael jordan to do commercials supporting him went nowhere.

Welcome to the club, NYCee. Couldn’t at least one of you called me a mean name before I go out to mow the lawn ? Like “prude” or something ? I’m going to get spoiled. Oh, well. Got two new mid-sized collage comps crudely plotted out today and that’s good enough. Carry on.

… is someone I didnt pay much attention to before, but who seems to talk bluntly, in a progressive manner, about issues

Bill Bradley I would have worked for in 2000 if he’d gotten the nomination. Instead, I voted for Nader. He has a far more progressive record than Gore & has always spoken very bluntly about the issues. I’m still saddened he didn’t get the nomination, but I think his public speaking being a bit to ‘academic’ might have been a part of that. He has the air of a professor.

There was an action here on March 19th to shut down Wall Street re the war profiteering. No dice, of course. The beat goes on, the ticker ticks on. But the effort was made. Unlike in SF, these protesters were arrested – 44 by police count.

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Police arrested 44 anti-war protesters outside the New York Stock Exchange on Monday after they lay down in front of the entrance to mark the fourth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

There was no impact on trade.

Uniformed police outnumbered the fewer than 100 protesters outside the stock exchange building at the corner of Broad and Wall streets in New York’s historic financial district.

Anyhow, I think the points that everyone is making about porn are very interesting. This is what is called a rational discussion – seeing different sides of an issue – it’s pluses it’s minuses – seeing the world through different lenses – something that is unfortunately sorely lacking on the BBB’s. touche fellow vipers…

And yes – if we’ve all pretty much agreed on everything here, I think it is the legalization of what is now pushed into the margins.

What was the point of Steven D’s diary. Recap: MSOC was right; I helped a friend once; she helped a friend yesterday.

Well, d’uh! That wasn’t the issue, was it?

And while these junior high school kiddies are busy hyperventilating about minsicule shit and their hallucinations about who’s writing about Armando’s life (who cares about his life??), I’m getting serious threats a la “You and your friends will pay. They have put the word out at Blackfive and we will find you.” – because I wrote an Iraq anniversary diary that some psycho didn’t like.

apparently maryscott hit the wrong time zone on the diary in haste, and ended up posting in mountain time zone instead of pacific, so it registered an hour later than it was in reality. the deletion, AFAIK, was at mcjoan’s request because of how ugly the thread was getting. personally i thought that the x-post on that one was a good move, in hopes of getting critical information on b&T (esp. address), as well as letting people know about the suicide note, since he was known at both sites. as drama goes, i thought it was quite justified.

miss dee – agreed on sexuality and porn. what sort of astounded me as the wife and i went through pregnancy classes last summer was how utterly useless all those sex ed classes were for actually understanding reproduction past “don’t touch it! don’t get knocked up! don’t get horrible venereal diseases!” i mean, there is this vast and varied facet to human experience, and the information they give you, if you’re lucky enough to get a sex ed class that doesn’t actively spread RW disinformation, is so pinched and narrow as to be nearly useless for most people’s interaction with their own and other people’s sexuality. that sex ed segment in “meaning of life,” silly as it was, would actually not be such a bad idea, or clinton’s surgeon general (IIRC) who advocated teaching kids about masturbation (those that somehow hadn’t figured it out by then).

the fucked-uppedness of a lot of porn and prostitution grows out of the sick culture itself. better to deal with the root, IMO. just being reasonable and equitable with sex in our society would ease a lot of those problems. my problem with prostitution is the capitalism and the power disparity, not the sex.

So.

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He’s not yet made it official and neither has she, but Jeb Bush, the likely Republican presidential candidate is showing no hesitation in criticizing likely Democratic presidential candidate, former Secretary…Click to Continue »

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(Reuters) - Indiana Governor Mike Pence said on Tuesday he will "correct" this week the state's new Religious Freedom Restoration Act to make it clear that businesses cannot use it to deny services to same-sex couples.

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Media

from Howl

I'm with you in Rockland
where we wake up electrified out of the coma
by our own souls' airplanes roaring over the
roof they've come to drop angelic bombs the
hospital illuminates itself imaginary walls collapse
O skinny legions run outside O starry
spangled shock of mercy the eternal war is
here O victory forget your underwear we're free
I'm with you in Rockland
in my dreams you walk dripping from a sea-
journey on the highway across America in tears
to the door of my cottage in the Western night

October 7 1955

"a remarkable collection of angelson one stage reading their poetry"
"I think Allen Ginsberg standing up there reading - putting himself on the line - was one of the two bravest things I've ever seen. Remember, it was '55. People had crew cuts, and they looked at you like you were misplaced cannon fodder. The country was being run by Luce publications. It was a dangerous, cold, ugly time, and it was scary. . .
In all our memories no one had been so outspoken in poetry before. We had gone beyond a point of no return. None of us wanted to go back to the grey, chill, militaristic silence, to the intellectual void - to the land without poetry - to the spiritual drabness. We wanted to make it new and we wanted to invent it and the process of it as we went into it. We wanted voice and we wanted vision."
-Michael McClure

Democrats…

Same as goddam fucking forever.
Over and over, in election year after election year, GE and MidTerms both… the Dems start to purr and preen, they stretch luxuriously - at just being TOLD they are going to win [...]
It never fails.
... in February of 2002, looking over the already joyless congressional stragglers willing to be drafted for duty… they barely dreamed, yet, it was even possible (Howard, a different person then, had not arrived to say it could be done)… but one thing was clear, we could not rely on the party to swing it. Could not. You could smell it, they would screw the deal. And I am not talking about Howard and primary issues here. By the end, that was a passing political story. Chuck it on the heap.
[...]
Upshot? The Republicans make it thru. They hold on.